The creator of The Fit Body Guides is apt to post photos of appetizing healthy foods, motivational quotes, and many a fit mirror selfie. But she also throws in before-and-after photos of women (which she calls her #fbggirls) who've taken her 12 week training guide and seen tremendous results for further inspo.
India is reaching peaks of using the Internet, and is being officially become the second country in the world for its Internet connection. And of course that this is an extraordinary news for Mark Zuckerberg.
Instagram, platforms super famous for sharing photos on the Internet in 2012 was bought by Facebook for $ 1 billion, doubled its base of users monthly active in India during the period between this September and that of passing, reports Telegraph.
"Instagram has gained immense popularity and people are using it to express themselves," said the managing director of Facebook for India. "Our monthly active users already have doubled over the past year and the momentum continues to build," he said.
In September it was said that the company has reached 400 million users, and over 75 percent of that number live outside the US.
Through summer online courses, high schoolers can tackle advanced subjects, prepare for college entrance exams and retake classes.
Students looking for online help preparing for the SAT and ACT can use free online practice exams and video tutorials whenever their summer schedule allows.
Kim Davie remembers her reaction when her mom suggested she and twin sister Shayla enroll in a summer online course after their freshman year.
"I wasn't all for it," she says sheepishly.
A year later, though, both Houston-area high schoolers are willingly returning for another summer with the International Connections Academy to get a head start on next fall's course material. Shayla will take statistics after enrolling in Algebra 2 a year ago. Kimberly will study physics after last year's geometry course. Both expect a similar summer as last year, when they still had time for cheerleading camp, fitness camp and a vacation to Mexico.
"You could still work the class into your schedule," Kim says. "Any free time you had, you could use it."
Whether the goal is getting a head start like the Davie sisters, tackling advanced subjects, preparing for college entrance exams or even retaking difficult classes, summer provides an unique opportunity forcollege-bound high schoolers to use online learning options.
"You might be traveling or you might be doing a summer enrichment program, things like that," says Michael Boothroyd, Kaplan Test Prep's executive director of SAT and ACT programs. "So online programs obviously travel with you."
And students have plenty of choices. Of the 75 percent of school districts nationwide which offer some sort of online or blended courses, the vast majority do so during the summer months, says Susan Patrick, president and CEO of the International Association for K-12 Online Learning. Then there are more than two dozen states with statewide virtual schools, programs run by private companies like Connections, and a stable of traditional college test-prep companies like Kaplan that have moved their services online.
"I think it's really important for students to determine the goal of why they want to enroll in a summer school class," Patrick says. Students considering an online course should also find out what the cost may be – even some public school systems charge a fee – as well as the format of a given course and an instructor's involvement, she says.
Class format can vary quite widely, and in some cases could conflict with other summer plans.
With the International Connections Academy, the Davies sisters estimate they spend two hours a day studying. But at programs designed specifically for high-performing or gifted students, like theAccelerated Summer Option through Northwestern University's Center for Talent Development, students can spend as much as six hours a day on compact nine-week honors and Advanced Placement courses.
[Discover the keys to success in advanced placement courses.]
Eric Calvert, the Center for Talent Development's associate director, says the program generally isn't a good fit for students looking to wedge summer learning into the margins of a busy schedule that may include vacations, camps or other enrichment opportunities. That's not often an issue, though, because such programs typically draw enthused students who have prioritized the program, Calvert says.
Conversely, students looking for online help preparing for the SAT and ACT may not even choose to enroll in a class, but rather use free online practice exams and video tutorials at their disposal whenever their summer schedule allows. taken by/usnews.com
The right kind of online MBA residency has the networking perks to make missing work worth it, experts say.
Residency requirements can give online MBA students face-to-face access to businesses or industry leaders they may not encounter elsewhere.
For busy working professionals considering an MBA, online programs can certainly have their appeal.Online MBA students get to avoid the daily commute to campus and keep their day jobs without relocating across the country.
But students who think they can complete their degree without ever filling up the gas tank or banking some air miles may be mistaken.
Some online MBA options – and many of the top programs – have residency components that require students to meet up at certain locations throughout the year. Students may spend days or weeks participating in seminars, socializing and learning from business leaders.
[Explore networking tips for online MBA students.]
"For online MBA programs at any business school of national status, a required residency component (big or small) is predominant," says Phil Powell, faculty chairman of Kelly Direct, Indiana University'sonline business school programs, through email. "I think it has evolved as a common standard."
While residencies can have a host of benefits, including making an online MBA program feel intimate, experts say they're not always a viable option for prospective students in terms of time and money. Before students choose to pursue a program with a residency program, in other words, they should have a sense of what they're getting into.
While residencies can have a host of benefits, including making an online MBA program feel intimate, experts say they're not always a viable option for prospective students in terms of time and money. Before students choose to pursue a program with a residency program, in other words, they should have a sense of what they're getting into.
Among the potential benefits of online MBA residencies is the chance to build a professional network.
While establishing personal and professional connections is one of the most important parts of MBA programs, creating that network in an online program isn't always easy. "One of the challenges of an online MBA is that you really don't get that personal touch – it can be a bit distant," says Hansel Rodriguez, a student at the University of North Carolina—Chapel Hill's online MBA program, called MBA@UNC.
Rodriguez got a chance to strengthen his network by taking part in three residencies, or what his program calls immersions, in New York, San Francisco and Mumbai, India.
UNC's program requires students to participate in a three-day immersion experience from Friday through Sunday at least twice during their studies. The weekends, which are offered both domestically and abroad, combine classes, socializing and meetings with business and thought leaders.
"It gives you the opportunity to see your classmates in a social setting, and you get to build those social relationships," says Rodriguez, director of operations for the National Security Council at the White House. "I just went to a classmate of mine's wedding – it shows you the kind of relationships you get to build."
Another perk of residencies, experts say, is their ability to enhance the MBA educational experience. While students can soak up a lot of knowledge in an online classroom, residency requirements can give them face-to-face access to businesses, industry leaders and faculty who they may not encounter elsewhere.
Leah Miller, a student in the online MBA program at Pennsylvania State University—World Campus, says the chance to have practical experience outside the classroom was one of the main reasons she chose a program with a residency. In May of 2014, she and her classmates had a weeklong stay in Virginia, where they shadowed and studied the Mitre Corporation, a nonprofit company that operates federally funded research and development centers. At the end of the residency, students were expected to create a presentation analyzing the company.
"There was someone of the executive level at everything we did," says Miller. "Having that time to interact with them, that was really eye-opening for us."
Unfortunately, even prospective students who want a residency requirement might not be able to swing it.
Unfortunately, even prospective students who want a residency requirement might not be able to swing it.
"Possible drawbacks would probably be logistics and financing," says Ashley Kilburn, MBA coordinator for the University of Tennessee—Martin. Students typically have to front travel costs and use vacation days for these opportunities, she says.
Some companies may allow students to attend a residency without using vacation days, but that is rare, Kilburn says.
Miller, manager of operations innovation at The Hershey Company, was able to get her company to let her attend residency without taking vacation days by explaining how the program would help her better manage capital projects, part of her job.
The downside: On top of 12 hours a day of school commitments, there was still her own work to do. "It was a tough week," she says. taken by/usnews.com
By forming online learning institutes and collecting data about student progress, programs hope to improve virtual learning.
The University of Phoenix and DeVry University have implemented systems that run an analysis to look for troubling patterns in a student's progress.
For many online students, the flexibility of an online degree or certification program outweighs the possibility of a less immersive student experience.
But without having to physically walk into a classroom, an adviser’s office or a study session, experts say students who are struggling to keep up or stay interested in course work are sometimes more difficult to recognize and easier to ignore.
As a result, some programs are using innovative methods to foster an online educational experience that is more supportive, engaging, and responsive to student demands.
Among those tactics are the use of big, integrated data and analytics to help identify and supportstruggling students, the creation of research bodies devoted to studying online learning methods, and the development of collaborative relationships with virtual student clubs and associations.
[Learn about the debate over graduation rates for online students.]
Big Data
In an online environment, a professor may not know if a student is dropping out of courses, turning her assignments in at the last possible moment or not engaging directly with online course materials.
At the University of Phoenix and DeVry University, that's where integrated data systems come in.
Within the last two years, both for-profit institutions have implemented systems that unify data from all points across a student's online experience, run an analysis to look for troubling patterns in that student's progress and potentially alert an academic adviser if danger signs are seen.
"The system looks at everything," says Constance St. Germain, the executive dean of the University of Phoenix's colleges of humanities and sciences and social sciences. "It looks at what they're accessing in terms of textbooks. Are they posting in the classroom? How are they responding to fellow peers? Are they submitting assignments late?"
The University of Phoenix implemented its integrated data system about 18 months ago, officials said. DeVry University piloted its system last summer, and then applied it across the institution's online division this March, says vice president of operations Earl Frischkorn.
"It's data that we have naturally in the course of working with the students inside the institution," says Frischkorn, whose school is also in a data research partnership with Stanford University. "It's just that we're putting it together, and we have a little better sense of the student's situation."
[Video: Find out if your online program is legit.]
Frischkorn says it will take at least a few academic cycles before any judgments can be made on current systems' effectiveness, noting that it's one thing to identify whether a student is at risk, and another entirely to identify why, let alone solve the problem.
Further, just because a student is identified doesn't mean he or she will welcome assistance.
"You can't force anybody to get help that they don't want," St. Germain says. "The only thing you can do is make sure to reach out, to show that you care. Believe it or not, a lot of times, students just want the question, 'Is everything OK?'"
Research Centers
The University of Florida's Online Learning Institute may be in the nascent stages of its development, but its research interests show a strong focus on issues surrounding student engagement. taken by/usnews.com
The new entrants admitted to nearly all ranked programs are predominantly adults aged 25 and older who have some credit already applied toward their degrees. Consequently, the factors U.S. News selected to make comparisons between programs were not measures like high school class rank or standardized test scores. Instead, U.S. News chose factors that weigh how these programs are being delivered and their effectiveness at awarding affordable degrees in a reasonable amount of time.
U.S. News assessed schools based on four general categories. Here is a look at each category and its weight in the current rankings formula. All are unchanged from 2014.
• Student engagement (40 percent): Quality bachelor's degree programs promote participation in courses, allowing students opportunities to readily interact with their instructors and classmates, as is possible in a campus-based setting. In turn, instructors not only are accessible and responsive, but they also are tasked with helping to create an experience rewarding enough that students stay enrolled and complete their degrees in a reasonable amount of time.
• Faculty credentials and training (20 percent): Strong online programs employ instructors with academic credentials that mirror those of instructors for campus-based programs, and they have the resources to train these instructors on how to teach distance learners.
• Peer reputation (20 percent): A survey of high-ranking academic officials helps account for intangible factors affecting program quality that are not captured by statistics. Also, degrees from programs that are well respected by academics may be held in higher regard among employers.
• Student services and technology (20 percent): Programs that incorporate diverse online learning technologies allow greater flexibility for students to take classes from a distance. Outside of classes, strong support structures provide learning assistance, career guidance and financial aid resources commensurate with quality campus-based programs.
How the Rankings Were Calculated
U.S. News selects factors, known as ranking indicators, to assess each program in the categories outlined above. A program's score for each ranking indicator is calculated using data that the program reported to U.S. News in a statistical survey. The value for each ranking indicator is standardized about its mean to account for statistical variance.
U.S. News multiplies these standardized values by weights it has selected for the ranking indicators and then sums these values to compute the five separate category scores. Each of these category scores is rescaled for display purposes on usnews.com so that the top-scoring school receives a display score of 100 and the bottom-scoring school receives a display score of zero.
To produce the overall scores, U.S. News takes the raw category scores before they have been rescaled and multiplies them by the category weights detailed above. The resulting scores are then rescaled from zero to 100.
Numerical rankings are assigned to programs in descending order of their overall scores, with the highest-scoring program ranked No. 1. Schools with tied scores are tied in the rankings.
Programs whose overall scores are in the bottom 25 percent are categorized as Rank Not Published. U.S. News calculates numerical ranks for these schools but does not publish them.
For the 2015 rankings, 10 schools are designated as unranked because they reported having fewer than 10 students enrolled or because their programs were less than a year old at the time of data collection. U.S. News did not calculate a numerical rank for these schools.
All unranked and Rank Not Published programs are still listed in the searchable directory.
Data Collection
Gathering the information necessary to create the 2015 Best Online Bachelor's Programs rankings required two steps. Step one was compiling a list of schools offering bachelor's degree programs online. Step two was collecting data from these schools.
To complete step one, U.S. News sent statistical questionnaires to regionally accredited public, private and for-profit institutions granting bachelor's degrees. Respondents were asked if they would be offering a bachelor's degree program through Internet-based distance education courses in the 2014-2015 academic year.
U.S. News defines a distance education program as follows (along the same lines as the U.S. Department of Education's definition):
A program for which all the required course work for program completion is able to be completed via distance education courses that incorporate Internet-based learning technologies. Distance education courses are courses that deliver instruction to students who are separated from the instructor and support regular and substantive interaction between the students and the instructor synchronously or asynchronously. Note: Requirements for coming to campus for orientation, testing or academic support services do not exclude a program from being classified as an online bachelor's degree program.
Between the start of data collection in July 2014 and the September 2014 closing date, 296 schools, or 17 percent of schools surveyed, said they would be offering online bachelor's degree programs in accordance with the definition, while the rest either said they would not or chose not to respond. This count is up from 283 the previous year.
To complete step two, U.S. News used the same questionnaire to collect additional statistical information from the 296 schools with online programs. This information was scored as outlined in the table below. (Note: All student and faculty statistical data are for the July 1, 2013, to June 30, 2014, cohorts, while the remaining data reflect policies, services and technologies in place at the time of the questionnaire completion in summer 2014.) taken by/usnews.com
Facebook is testing new ways for you less information about the former partner, without completely disconnected from social relationship with the person from whom you share.
Once you change your status to the relationship, Facebook will offer you a different set of tools that enable you to see a little of the life of former partner.
With these tools, Facebook will allow them to decide which content you care about the person that you share, offering numerous opportunities, including the possibility that information to see them only if you visit him or her profile .
These tools Facebook is already tested in the US and its mobile Version, to see the reactions, but Facebook has plans to continue expanding these new functions in the future.
Xiaomi has planned holding a new event for the media on 24 November, in which the expected launch of an advanced model of mobile phone.
Earlier it was said that it would be launching redmi Note 2 Pro, but apparently the new fableti Chinese company will be called Xiaomi redmi Note 3.
Xiaomi already posted some pictures of the device in the Chinese social networks, citing the name of "redmi Note 3" and the date of its launch.
According to numerous, fableti Xiaomi will come with screen 5.5 "Full HD with MediaTek MT6795 Helio X10 with 3GB of RAM and 32GB of internal memory.
Other specifications include a 13MP main camera, front camera of 5MP and 4,000 mAh battery. (Telegraph)
The survey conducted in September by Consumer Intelligence Research Partners (CIRP) of Apple's 500 US consumers found that 101 million iPhones are currently in use in this country.
Almost two thirds of these models are phones Apple iPhone 6 or younger, while the use of the iPhone has almost doubled in two years from the beginning of 2013.
iPhone 6 and 6 Plus models are most popular iPhone, which was launched in September 2014 with over 60 million units, twice more than the iPhone 5S sales realized a year ago.
Lower sales figures of iPhone 6s / 6s Plus on the first weekend undoubtedly have grown much more now, and surely that are included in the overall total.
CIRP findings suggest that the iPhone "PLUS" is paid well for Apple, and now make up a large chunk of sales of the iPhone in the United States.
But the findings also show that the rate of adoption for iPhone is slowing, and the US shows that the market is maturing. (Telegraph)
